Some of 2022’s last new and archival wares face scrutiny. Including things from Moving Statues, Suzy Mangion, Sairie, Andy Bell and others

In the relentless marathon to cover just some of the things dropping into the reviewables in-tray this year, here’s one last lap before collapsing in a heap under some thermal blankets.

If it weren’t for the fact that Rusted Rail’s main protagonists were tucked up in and around Galway, Ireland, far from this Concrete Islands satellite enclave, then this scribe might be slightly suspicious they hadn’t been sneaking inside to make cheeky mixtapes from cherished sections of his record collection in the middle of the night.

Astutely digging into some rich sonic strata from the 1990s, 2000s and 2010s, this full-length debut from Moving Statues – partnering co-leads Keith Wallace (Loner Deluxe, Cubs, A Lilac Decline) with Brian Kelly (So Cow) and featuring visiting vocals from the ever charming Cecilia Danell (A Lilac Decline, Loner Deluxe, Cubs) – serves up a diverse DIY feast. Following on from two preceding still-fresh digital-only EPs – key parts of which are reprised within – You Look Like You’ve Seen a Ghost mixes up sideways songcraft and instrumental detours with contagious self-confidence.

Thus, spooling through the song-based parts of the cassette/digital collection, we find two Kelly-voiced tracks (“Run Out” and “Time Signatures”) unknowingly and balmily recalling the first two sublime Rocket Girl-dispensed albums from 1999 and 2000 by Philadelphia’s much-missed Mazarin; Wallace’s sole solo-voiced number “New Year’s Eve on Mirror Lake” tangling-up J Mascis in Grandaddy’s studio cables; and the Danell-fronted “Sad Dog in the Rain”, “Hold Your Horse” and “Broken Headphones” beautifully envisioning Madder Rose’s Mary Lorson working with members of Stereolab and Yo La Tengo, in varying configurations.

The wordless cuts aren’t flimsy filler moments either, as we’re led through the delightfully fuzzy “Wooden Sleepers” and the wobbly effervescent “Square Castle Smoke” (which curiously also mirror the wordless interludes found on the aforementioned Mazarin LPs); the most languid side of Eternal Tapestry via “Harmonic Hills” and “Moving Statues Go Raven”; the blissful Six Organs of Admittance electro-acoustics across “Cards”; and the woozy synthscaping of “The Wreck of the PT280”.

Beguiling stuff, from a label consistently delivering quality goods from its collectivist creators.

Covering all of his bases, to not run any risk of exclusion from this last review column of the year, Mat Handley presents strong statements from each of his label portals; namely Fenny Compton, Preston Capes and Woodford Halse.

Hence, first up, we find Sairie supplying the long-awaited first-ever Fenny Compton outing, with the sumptuously packaged two-song lathe-cut 7”. Fusing together the pastoral-psych of Espers with the airier atmospheric Anglo-folk strains of Sharron Kraus, the coupling of the mystic “The Breeze of the Meadow” and a lilting madrigal-flavoured reinterpretation of “Over the Hills and Far Away” makes for a fine calling card for both the Brighton-based trio and the fledgling Fenny Compton modus operandi.

Over on Handley’s second oldest imprint, Preston Capes, comes the unexpected curveball of Continuum. Eschewing the one-man–and-his-home-studio electronic extremities that have characterised most of the Preston Capes canon so far, this six-track suite of extended cuts from the Bristol-centric Omega Institute – currently made-up of Nigel Bryant (synths), Carl Cotrell (bass), Aiden Searle (drums) and James McKeown (from Hawksmoor, also on synths) – is a somewhat radical shift into the sound of an actual band seemingly playing in a room together.

Quite hard to pin down on paper, the foursome forge terrifically jammy post-jazz-meets-dub soundscapes that mash together elements of To Each-to-Sextet-era A Certain Ratio, the first Tortoise album, Trans Am circa Futureworld and Oneida’s Secret Wars, into eerily foreboding as well as hypnotically slinky explorations. Indulgent yes – but benevolently intoxicating with it. Ones to keep close tabs on, especially if the cited reference points resonate.

Bringing it all back home to the Woodford Halse mothership and its captain is the eponymous album from The Overload. Originally available as a download-only, around 2016, this physical outing on cassette – with five previously unheard bonus tracks on the download counterpart – from the pairing of Handley himself and Allan Murphy of Midwich Youth Club, is an elevating delight. Full of Kraftwerkian clanks and pulses, early-OMD buoyancy and pre-Dare Human League moodiness, it may not contain the most dramatically innovative of musical cross-fertilisations, but its grooves and melodicism solidly reward the ears, with the digital extras providing some of the choicest pleasures.

With both Woodford Halse and Drone Rock Records having given us respective cassette and vinyl manifestations for Ritual 74 from Studio Kosmische earlier this year, Dom Martin’s newly-prolific Feral Child Recordings imprint has picked up the baton, to give three more numerically-anointed sets turntable friendly incarnations of albums from this side-project of The Hologram People’s Dom Keen, after earlier non-vinyl appearances elsewhere.

At time of writing and subject to rescheduling, two of them are set to sneak out a few weeks apart, just before and after Christmas. The first to appear is the more solitary Alpha 77, with its immersive dronescapes and near-ecclesiastical evocations gliding through the same astral plane ambience previously visited by Tangerine Dream, Brian Eno, Eat Lights Become Lights and Polypores.

Contrastingly, the soon-to-follow Omega 76, is a more animated and communalist collection, with Keen joined by Robin Waterson on a variety of instruments and Hologram People bandmate Jon Parkes on drums/percussion. Therefore, we’re ushered into the same bubbling waters as Harmonia (“Constellation in the North”), the psych-rock terrain of Amon Düül II (“Ethnic Forgery” and “Skimming Over Pluto”), the electro-fizz of Michael Bundt (“The Robots Cruise” and “Stuck in the Sequence”) and the lysergic fog of Spacemen 3 (“Blues in Space”).

Fans of Feral Child’s now-dormant sibling label Deep Distance will want these two without question, as well as being primed for the vinyl version of Gamma 75, also over the horizon in early-2023.

Staying in the Dom Martin labyrinth a little longer, we find the very final – for now at least – release from his much loved Polytechnic Youth outlet, in the shape of the 10-inch Always Waiting at Shibuya Station EP from Germany’s Shibuya Station. The brainchild of Marc Schaffe and friends, the six gathered tracks put down a neat full stop on the PY story so far, by honouring and revisiting the enterprise’s early years penchant for darkwave synth-pop. At times imagining some unearthed collaborative demos cut by Ian Curtis, Nico, Paul Humphreys, Vince Clarke and Martyn Ware, the half-dozen pieces bring forth plenty of the grit and giddiness that have provided the backbone of the PY canon over the years.

Aside from the emergence of a stunning long-lost track with a recent reissue-ish of Piano Magic’s Writers Without Homes and some recordings with Ghostwriter, it’s been a tad too long since we last heard from the gifted Suzy Mangion (George, Arbol et al.). The re-emergence process begins subtly with Location: Gilsland (Turning Circle), a digital soundtrack with a substantial booklet accompaniment to a short film by Mangion and Katie Mason, about a curious post-BBC career move by the rightly revered Radiophonic Workshop pioneer Delia Derbyshire.

Focusing in on the period that Derbyshire spent as a radio operator for a company building gas pipelines across Northern England between 1973 and 1978, the score is very much in the spirit of the late composer’s most mesmeric sound design works, whilst also drawing upon Mangion’s own otherworldly skillset.

Replete with field recordings, disembodied spoken word passages from guest contributors, antiquarian synth sculpting, piano, churchy organ, home-made noises, indeterminate instrumentation and some of Mangion’s fleeting spectral ululations, the soundtrack conjures up supernatural aural settings that are both wraithlike and imposing.

Veering through Vangelis-tinged cinematics (“Theme to Location: Gilsland (Delta Calling)”), spooked Victoriana (“First Time Out”), eerie choral ambience (“Going Going”), vintage sound effects collaging (“I Measured the Skies”) and beatific layered pirouetting (“Pitch Perception”), Location: Gilsland packs a lot of invention and allure into its slender 22-minute runtime, implanting a deep desire for a fuller return for Suzy Mangion, sooner rather than later.

Rounding-out Modern Aviation’s remarkable run of releases this annum, comes a cassette/download conjoining from Lila Tristram and The Last Dinosaur. Whilst the epic haiku titled Black and White Memories Ignited by the Scent of Springtime Explode in Colour might suggest a phantasmagorical psych-prog odyssey, the five-song EP is an altogether more restrained affair. Indeed, so restrained at times, it almost disappears inside its own barely-there ghostliness.

Whilst Tristram partially reprises the elusive persona adopted across her Our Friends solo set from 2020 on Where It’s At Is Where You Are, her fusion with the polymathic pastoralism of The Last Dinosaur (AKA Jamie Cameron and friends), comes with another tier of appealing mystery.

Consequently, Black and White Memories… requires concentrated listening, as if airing some precious lost and unmixed tapes from a recently discovered secret studio session involving Vashti Bunyan and guest players that Ivo Watts-Russell once conscripted from his extended 4AD family for This Mortal Coil albums.

Stitching together sparse piano lines, strings, other inscrutable textures and Tristram’s elusive elegiac tones, you could possibly classify this as bucolic ethereal chamber music – but ultimately ‘exquisite’ seems to fit the bill more simply and accurately. Yet another Modern Aviation must-buy.

To conclude a very kaleidoscopic year for Castles in Space, arrives a double-dose of Dean Honer (The Sound of Science, The Eccentronic Research Council, et al.). The vinyl portion captures a creative hook-up with Supreme Vagabond Craftsman (AKA Will Goddard), in the form of Frogman.

It finds Honer’s EMS Synthi essays framing Goddard’s spoken word sci-fi tale set in Sheffield, with guest voices from the likes of Pulp’s Russell Senior. The net result joins the narrative and audio dots between Threads, Tom Baker-era Doctor Who, Survivors and The Eccentronic Research Council’s The Dreamcatcher Tapes Volumes 1 & 2.

Additionally, the simultaneously-released Honer-only cassette set Frog Bones and Noodles pretty much does what it says on the tin, by scooping up leftover synth sketches to sate the hungriest of his followers.

Topping-off a sturdy – and at times revelatory – run of BBC session archive curations across 2022, Precious Recordings of London has now found the time and resources to upsize from double-7” to 10” EPs.

Whilst no less than four sets of sessions from The Soup Dragons – split equally between John Peel and Janice Long vault extractions across 1986 and 1987 – rousingly and rowdily bridge the gap between The Buzzcocks and The Gun Club, to prove that there was far more to the Scottish band than an almost accidental hit cover of The Rolling Stones’ “I’m Free” in 1990, it’s Boyracer’s John Peel Session 02.09.94 that is actually the more fascinating new/old find.

As the sleevenotes from still-in-charge-to-this-day guitarist/singer Stewart Anderson suggest, although the Yorkshire-birthed ensemble had a Sarah Records-affiliation around the time of the session, they were a gnarlier proposition compared to the more gentle jangling stereotype of the label’s overall oeuvre.

Hence, this date-stamped Maida Vale-documented line-up of the group feels more indebted to The Vaselines, Pixies and The Breeders than say Heavenly or The Orchids, as vocalist/bassist Nicola Hodgkinson jostles with Anderson over four ramshackle but compelling co-ed indie-pop noise nuggets, fleshed out by second guitarist Matty Green and drummer Ged McGurn. Yet another band worthy of (re)discovery through the Precious Recordings prism.

Not to be outdone on the 10-inch front, Sonic Cathedral closes its own fecund 2022 with three EPs in the format, from Andy Bell. Repeating and extending upon 2021’s 12”, 10” and 7” series that gave an alternative takes and extras afterlife for 2020’s The View from Halfway Down album, Bell follows up this year’s double Flicker LP with a triumvirate of extended-players – I Am a Strange Loop, The Grounding Process and Untitled Film Stills.

Respectively, the trio bring out some choice remixes, acoustic versions and some intelligent covers, to remind us of the hidden non-album joys often found on early-90s EPs from bands on Creation and 4AD. Like the previous aforementioned ‘ever decreasing circles’ platters from last year, which were rounded-up on the Another View CD, this trilogy should also be considered for anthologising once the vinyl is long gone, given the quality of the material spread over its six sides.

Continuing Clay Pipe Music’s already highly enjoyable 3” CD mini-album catalogue, as well as making conceptual connections back to 2021’s Yuletide flexi-disc from David Boulter, comes the utterly wonderful Winterfest from Cate Brooks.

Featuring five glistening instrumentals built around combinations of icy elegiac synths, snowflake-covered piano and the occasional frosted drum machine – with the plaintive intimate “First Night” and the shimmering preternatural “Julmust” being the most magical moments – this is the near-perfect soundtrack for wrapping up in the comfort of a warm coat and taking a starlit walk on a cold crisp December night.

Adrian
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